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 Christian Taylor became the latest unarmed black man to die at the
hands of a white police officer after officials said he was seen on
security surveillance tape vandalizing cars at an auto dealership in
Arlington.
Taylor was shot four times by Arlington police officer Brad Miller,
49, who was still undergoing training with the department, Arlington
police chief Will Johnson said on Saturday. The Tarrant County
Medical Examiner's Office found Taylor had gunshot wounds to the
neck, chest and abdomen.
But Johnson did not explain what led to what he described as a
confrontation inside dealership building that led Miller to open
fire on Taylor, while a second police officer used a Taser. The
officers were not wearing body cameras.
Taylor's brother Joshua, 23, said the family wanted details of what
happened, calling the information from the police "blurry."
"Until we get concrete facts, we won't know what happened," Joshua
Taylor told Reuters in a phone interview.
 "He was a really good guy. He was family-oriented. He was an A
student and had he everything going for him," Taylor said, adding
that his brother had "recently given his life to God."
"He was happy, everything was great. He was trying to touch people's
lives," Joshua Taylor said.
His father Adrian Taylor said he had no idea what led Christian, a
college football player at Angelo State University, to smash a car
though the window of the dealership on Friday.
"You know, it could have been too much drinking. He could have been
wrong place at the wrong time," Adrian Taylor told the CBS Dallas TV
affiliate, CBS 11.
Taylor's death came just ahead of the one-year anniversary of the
fatal shooting of teenager Michael Brown at the hands of a white
officer in Ferguson, Missouri, that ignited protests across U.S.
cities.
On a Twitter account appearing to belong to Christian Taylor, the
teenager commented about police violence. "Police taking black lives
as easy as flippin a coin, with no consequences smh," says one
message posted in December, using the acronym for shaking my head.
Less than two weeks ago, he posted; "I don't wanna die too
younggggg."
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Miller was placed on leave after the shooting and Johnson said he
had asked the Federal Bureau of Investigation to help investigate
Taylor's death. The FBI is expected to respond to the request on
Monday, an Arlington police spokeswoman said.
The two police officers were responding to a call from a security
company on Friday about a burglary at the dealership in Arlington.
Police said Taylor drove his own car or a car belonging to his
family into the dealership.
Edited portions of security surveillance video released to the media
shows Taylor jumping on top of cars parked outside dealership and
attempting to stomp out a front windshield. It does not show the
shooting or the moments leading up to it.
Johnson said when the officers arrived they found Taylor had driven
a vehicle into the front of the building. He ran to another part of
the building, where he tried to escape through a locked door.
Taylor had a prior arrest involving the unauthorized possession of
prescription painkillers, police said. He was sentenced to six
months deferred-adjudication probation in December.
Joshua Taylor described the incident as "normal teenage stuff" and
said Christian had "turned his life around."
(Reporting by Marice Richter in Dallas and Laila Kearney in New
York; Editing by Jill Serjeant and Lisa Shumaker)
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